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Thick fog met me at dawn, not the sleepy kind that coffee cuts through, but dripping wet, zero visibility, fog created through the convergence of cold ocean water and warm air. The fog retreated and advanced repeatedly before it was beaten back by high wattage sunshine. The westerly wind blew throughout, at 5 – 15 knots only rising near sunset to closer to 20. The barometer started a gradual drop in pressure late morning yet the forecast is for sunshine and continuing westerlies.

There were a few whale watching boats in the area mid-morning with two observed in the Ecological Reserve. Sports fishing boats were seen in the general area but outside the Reserve.

The elephant seals found the trek to seawater quite an effort today and some of them gave up for a few hours on the way to have a swim. Getting back up the hill was even more of an effort.

The tide is a long way out.

Observational efforts were focused in the inter-tidal and on the mega-fauna census today. Another really good tide (0.5m) allowed me to do a large algal survey and find more marine invertebrate species. I will share some of the invertebrates here and come back to the seaweeds tomorrow. In each photo, if you look closely you will notice smaller and smaller animals in a wall to wall competition for space or is it sharing of space.

Both the natural and human history at Race Rocks are profound.

California Mussel beds are ‘old growth’ and substantial on Great Race. The large area provides important habitat creating significant diversity.

Extensive mussel beds on the south side of Great Race.

A brooding sea anemone (Epiactus prolifera) with numerous offspring attached low on the column near the pedal disc.

The mottled sea anemone (Urticina crassicornis) is quite common in the low inter-tidal on the south side of Great Race.

This species of tubeworm, named after Vancouver (Eudistylia vancouverensis) is usually more abundant sub-tidally. Here in the high current area between Great Race and South Islands, it is common in the low inter-tidal.

There is a lot of gigantism on the Pacific coast but here at Race Rocks even the giant species seem even more abundant and bigger than I have seen them elsewhere.

The gumboot chiton (Cryptochiton stelleri) is an important grazer in the inter-tidal. They are very abundant here.

The Black Leather Chiton (Katharina tunicata) is another grazer and like the gumboot chiton grows both very large and is super abundant here.

Orange sea cucumbers (Cucumaria miniata) are really abundant both in tide pools and under the edges of boulders and there a lot of boulders on the south side.

Three species of sea urchin were observed today, adding the green urchin (Stronglyocentrotus drobachiensis) to the list. The green and purple both like to “dress-up” aka cover themselves, with shells, seaweeds and even bits of wood. Here they were using empty limpet shells in an area frequented by oystercatchers.

Green and purple sea urchins with a small orange nudibranch to their left (Rostanga pulchra) that usually lives on the red sponge Ophlitasponge.

“Aequorea victoria, also sometimes called the crystal jelly, is a bioluminescent hydrozoan jellyfish, or hydromedusa, that is found off the west coast of North America. This species is thought to be synonymous with Aequorea aequoreaof Osamu Shimomura, the discoverer of green fluorescent protein (GFP). Shimomura together with Martin Chalfie and Roger Y. Tsien were awarded the 2008 Nobel Prize in Chemistry[1] for the discovery and development of this protein as an important biological research tool. Originally the victoria species was supposed to designate the variant found in the Pacific, and the aequorea designation was used for specimens found in the Atlantic and Mediterranean. The species name used in GFP purification was later disputed by M.N. Arai and A. Brinckmann-Voss (1980),[2] who decided to separate them on the basis of 40 specimens collected from around Vancouver Island. Osamu Shimomura notes that this species in general shows great variation: from 1961 to 1988 he collected around 1 million individuals in the waters surrounding the Friday Harbor Laboratories of University of Washington, and in many cases there were pronounced variations in the form of the jellyfish. “

From 1986, to 2005, Dr. Anita Brinckmann-Voss of Sooke, BC assisted the students and faculty of Lester Pearson College with her understanding of marine invertebrate ecology and her expertise in the taxonomy of hydroids. These small colonial animals, the alternate stage of the life-cycle of jellyfish, occur in rich profusion underwater at the Race Rocks Marine Ecological Reserve. When the original species list was done for the Race Rocks Ecological Reserve Proposal, in 1979, only 2 hydroids had been included on our species list. Now over 60 species have been identified by Anita and she continued to assist students with research projects while she furthered her research on specimens from the island until 2004. Anita has established long term research plots in a tidepool at the reserve and documents the distribution of hydroids underwater with the assistance of students and faculty in theDiving program at Lester B. Pearson College. Below: Anita accompanied Garry, Chris and Joe on a dive to Secretary Island, West of Race Rocks up the Strait of Juan de Fuca towards Sooke. The purpose was to collect samples for hydroid specimens.

A new species of colonial athecate hydroid,Rhysia fletcheri, is described from Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada, and from Friday Harbour, Washington, U.S.A. It’s relationship to Rhysia autumnalisBrinckmann from the Mediterranean and Rhysia halecii (Hickson and Gravely) from the Antarctic and Japan is discussed. Rhysia fletcheri differs from Rhysia autumnalisand Rhysia haleciiin the gastrozooid having distinctive cnidocyst clusters on its hypostome and few, thick tentacles.

Most of its female gonozooids have no tentacles. Colonies of R. fletcheri are without dactylozooids. The majority of R. fletcheri colonies are found growing on large barnacles or among the hydrorhiza of large thecate hydrozoans.

Rhysia fletcherioccurs in relatively sheltered waters of the San Juan Islands and on the exposed coast of Southern Vancouver Island. Colored photos of Rhysia males. females and gastrozooids are included.

Abstract:

An assemblage of 27 hydroid species was reported from a tide pool in the lower rocky intertidal zone, and compared with 42 hydroids of the adjacent subtidal region. Location of hydroids within the pool, seasonal occurrence, growth and sexual maturity were tabulated, and some systematic aspects discussed. Possible causes of hydroid species diversity were considered, including location of the tide pool in an area of tidal rapids, and shading by surfgrass and rock cliffs during low tide.

Chris Blondeau and Juan Carlos Yabar, did this survey to document the Invertebrates, particularly hydroids,sponges and colonial tunicates in the are where the turbine Piling was to be installed later in the year.

These images were scanned from 35 mm.slides taken by photomicrography of samples collected on permit at Race Rocks by Dr. Anita Brinckmann-Voss* with the assistance of students and faculty of Lester B. Pearson College. Scanning and preparation for html was done by Garry Fletcher.

Copyrighted 1999–All Images on this page are the property of: Dr. Anita Brinckmann- VossThey can not be used or modified without her written permission.

Rhizogeton nematophoorum The polyp measures less than 1 cm in height, so microscopic picures are necessary to show the details. Note large stalk of Garveia beside.

This is an unidentified species of the same genus Rhizogeton.

Clavactinia female polyp

Colony of Clavactinia sp.

Clavactinia group of males

Clavactinia feeding polyps

Clavactinia

Eudendrium sp.

Eudendrium sp.

Rhysia fletcheri

Tubularia sp.

Tubularia sp.

Abietinaria amphora

Abietinaria amphora

Abietinaria amphora

Symplectoscyphus turgidus

Clytia sp.colony with gonothek with medusae buds and enlarged hydranth. Found at Race Rocks, low intertidal.

These images were scanned from 35 mm.slides taken by photomicrography of samples collected on permit at Race Rocks by Dr. Anita Brinckmann-Voss* with the assistance of students and faculty of Lester B. Pearson College. Scanning and preparation for html was done by Garry Fletcher.

Copyrighted 1999–All Images on this page are the property of:Dr. Anita Brinckmann- VossThey can not be used or modified without her written permission.

Solmissus marshallilives in the midwater zone of seas. It feeds by swimming slowly with its tentacles stretched out. When animals bump into the tentacles, stinging cells fire and hold on. Depending on the size of the prey, it can take a jellyfish up to two hours to move food from its tentacles to its stomach. The jellyfish feeds on gelatinous animal plankton, other jellies and copepods. It is a secondary consumer.

In this video you can see two different species of jellyfish, Solimissus marshalli and Mitrocoma cellularia.These invertebrates are part of the phylum Cnidaria which include hydroids, scyphozoan jellyfishes, sea anemones, sea pens and corals. They are constructed of 2 layers of cells-the outer covering and the inner covering of the digestive cavity. Between is a jellylike layer (mesoglea). Some cells are specialized for digesting or stinging. The jellyfish is the sexual ‘medusa stage’ of a hydroid. The hydroid medusa has a membrane (velum) that grows inward from margin of the bell. Most of the 60 or so local jellyfishes are medusaes of hydrozoans; surprisingly very attractive, but usually very small and they often go unnoticed. These specimens were videoed by Jean-Olivier Dalphond and Damien Guihen on a sunny day of June 2001. Identification was by Dr. Anita Brinckmann-Voss. Anita regularly samples the waters of Race Rocks as well as nearby Eemdyck passage, Beecher Bay , Pedder Bay and Sooke harbour where the upwelling water from the Strait of Juan de Fuca often brings numerous medusae.